Tyre Wear

[ShaneM]

Hi Guys,

I’m a newbie to the site but been meaning to get on here for a while. We bought a 16 plate XC90 r-design with the 20 inch alloys and air suspension about 9 months ago now. I love the car and it does everything I wanted it to do, but we seem to be having 1 huge problem - it’s going through tyres in 8-9000 miles! Now I know this was a problem with the older version but I’ve heard nothing of this on the new model. Is anyone with a similar set up having this problem?
I bought this car as I do a lot of motorway miles and wanted the comfort this car brings. But I simply can’t afford to keep this up, I’m doing 20-30,000 miles a year. So that’s a lot of tyres. I’ve had the car checked out and alignment looked at and I’m being told everything is fine. With subtle hints maybe it’s my driving! But it’s not, it’s not that kind of car, I understand that.
Has anyone got any recommendations or advice? I’d appreciate any at the moment.

Thanks

Shane

[MOzS90]

Is the tyre wear uneven or uniform across the whole tread?

[anotherv60]

I don’t have the same car/wheels but on the qashqai we used to own we experienced this same issue and concluded it related to tyre brand, we got 30-40,000 miles from the Bridgestone tyres but only 11,000 out of the continentals. You can check the age of the tyre they are fitting it is on the sidewall, we found the continentals were 5 years old when fitted - don’t know if that was the real reason for the difference. You don’t want to do a design of experiments when it’s your own car/wallet.

[ShaneM]

Hi guys thanks for the replies.

The wear is pretty even. I have thought about a brand change from the continentals.
I was advised by Volvo Swansea to change the one tyre for the moment which they have logged everything for and they will see what happens. I’m not sure what thickness of tread the tyre starts at? But after just 400 miles the tyre was down to 4.3mm thick (bought a digital tread reader). Volvo recommend you think about changing your tyres at 3mm thick!

Has anyone not been happy with there continentals and changed brand?

[DeZemBer]

9k miles per set of tyres are crazy.My current Toyo tyres on my soon to be collected outlander phev does 60k (80% m25 miles) before needing any vhange.

[ShaneM]

And this is the point I have argued with my local Volvo. But literally all I seem to get is a shrug of the shoulders and told the car is fine.
I had to push the point and that’s when we agreed to change the 1 tyre and see how it goes.
I don’t know what else to do or say? I’m not sure any kind of warranty covers this “as the cars fine”. But how can it?

Anyway anymore suggestions/advice are much appreciated.

[DeZemBer]

To be fair to Volvo, I don't think any technical issue on the car could cause the wear on the tyres especially if you were saying the wear is uniform.

Maybe the set of tyres you've got is "expired" and changing to another brand might be a good start.

[Deman77]

How many sets have you gone through on this xc90? Is it the original set that you wore off in 9k or did you already put new tyres and wore it off in 9k? What make/model is the last set? If even wear (implying pressure not wrong) and you ruled out alignment it could be the tyre quality - most should show their manufacture week and year. If they were made a year or more before and badly stored the rubber could be degraded and wear excessively.

[Bernard F]

Originally Posted by ShaneM

Hi guys thanks for the replies.

The wear is pretty even. I have thought about a brand change from the continentals.
I was advised by Volvo Swansea to change the one tyre for the moment which they have logged everything for and they will see what happens. I’m not sure what thickness of tread the tyre starts at? But after just 400 miles the tyre was down to 4.3mm thick (bought a digital tread reader). Volvo recommend you think about changing your tyres at 3mm thick!

Has anyone not been happy with there continentals and changed brand?

New tyres are 7mm. At 400 miles they should still be 7mm or thereabouts. My last XC60 had continentals and when I PXed at about 23,000 they were still the original tyres with plenty of tread left.

[Philip Fisher]

Mine is a T8 on 19 inch wheels running Michelins. So different set up to you but a heavy car which I occasionally give the beans. 80 percent of driving is at 70ish on the motorway. Tyres are unlimited replacements as part of the lease so never really motivated to drive for tyre life.

I have got 22-23k out of the front sets. Backs were first replaced at 33k and I am now on 58k miles and they are still fine.

Also if one tyre on your car really went from brand new (which is 7 to 8mm) to 4.3mm in 400 miles then something is definitely wrong. At that wear rate you should have been able to see balls of rubber across the tyre surface as the rubber is literally ripping itself off.....